1. Statement of the Technical Field
The invention concerns land mobile radio equipment. More particularly, the invention concerns ancillary methods and systems for providing hands-free communication using land mobile radio equipment.
2. Description of the Related Art
The baseline configuration for public safety vehicular radios is to supply custom push-to-talk microphone and external speaker accessories in support of voice communications. This configuration has several disadvantages with regard to radio equipment users. For example, with such conventional systems, transmit operation require continuous use of one hand to depress the microphone PTT switch. This can cause operator distraction while driving a vehicle. Also, such conventional microphone systems are relatively bulky and expensive. Moreover, receive operation requires the installation and wiring of a speaker into the vehicle cabin. This can be a costly, intrusive and time consuming process.
Many public safety and emergency vehicles in use today have internal automobile stereo-speaker systems. Using these sounds systems, when available, would be preferred over installing a dedicated radio speaker. However, such an approach would require disassembly of the vehicle to access the speaker circuitry, and a suitable switching circuit to prevent interference with the automobile stereo system.